How To Help Clients Recover From The Festive Season
Our columnist, Dr. Annelize Meyer is the founder and Medical Director of the Meyer Clinic in Chichester, a premier center for preventative medicine, anti-aging, and regenerative aesthetics in the UK. Established in 2007, her clinic offers a comprehensive suite of services, from epigenetic and regenerative treatments to hormone therapy, wellness checks, and personalized nutritional programs. Known for her expertise in regenerative aesthetics, Dr. Meyer specializes in natural facial rejuvenation techniques and advanced, minimally invasive procedures. Her approach emphasizes holistic, patient-centered care, focusing on sustainable, evidence-based practices to promote health and wellness for women and families.
Fulfilling a packed 2024 has left many of us drained, and with a new fresh start looming for 2025 learning how to make the New Year work best for us all and for clients is very important. Putting in new practices that will take us through next year with greater ease is essential here and the key foundations to consider are:
Practising self-care, eating healthily, keeping hydrated, exercising regularly doing something you really enjoy, setting boundaries and knowing your personal limits, managing stress and prioritising sleep.
However, making this stick in 2025 and not just being a ‘January thing’, might require a few stricter, yet gentle points for us all to consider. Do we all need a massive detox? Probably not and steering away from adding yet another “need to do” on the wellbeing list, might actually relieve some health anxiety. By keeping things simple, success is more likely and so I would like to only suggest three key points for the post-festive season reset for 2025.
Reducing Sugar
If we focus on reducing added sugar as a main goal, we are on a winning streak! The incredible benefits we give our bodies by reducing this substance, is a gift that keeps on giving. However, understanding the impact and metabolic and hormonal chaos it creates does help to keep your resolve.
Most of us have heard of continuous sugar monitoring and historically this has been reserved for diabetic patients. More recently, companies like Hallo Lingo provide their own continuous sugar monitoring devices that are ideal is for the health conscious as well as the curious of mind. They have an app attached that helps with journalling and keeping track of what the impact is of different foods eaten as well as responses during different times in the day. I believe that these type of devices are best used with medical supervision when severe anxiety or eating disorders might be an issue.
I regularly suggest the use of these devices to my patients - having a visual understanding of how your blood sugar responds to foods, really brings in more awareness. This can all be done in quite a playful setting, so not getting too serious, and keep the curious mind ticking. It is after all a health journey, not a textbook.
If we look at what the NHS recommends, then we should have no more than seven added teaspoons of sugar per day. This is the same as seven sugar cubes. A teaspoon of sugar is around 4 gm of sugar, so we can all very easily see what we consume by reading the label. We really should not have more than 28-30gm of added sugar per day. If we take orange juice for example, we very easily will use up all our sugar pennies in one go - for 100ml of orange juice equals two out of seven sugar cubes. A sugary yoghurt three to four sugar cubes.
So, by having an awareness of the amount of added sugar in our food choices, that we should definitely not go over, and ideally stay well under, combined with a device that shows us exactly what foods trigger a sugar rush, will help us be on a home run for balancing metabolic health.
The benefit? More energy, clearer thinking, less pain, better weight control and all over improved wellbeing.
Me Time
Time for yourself can take on any format, and the idea is to give yourself a gentle break, however best you prefer. So, a break from needing to give out to others and moving the energy to receiving for yourself is key.
Combining nature, movement and breathing wins hands down into rebalancing the body into a receiving state. It aids natural detoxification and doesn’t cost anything. In my view planning these events does help, and penciling these treats into your diary with a heading “self love” can help bring attention back to just how important you are.
Me time also means spending time with people who share the same energy vibration as you do. You normally know when people do as you feel relaxed and revived when you spend time with them rather than drained after any interaction.
Feeding Ourselves Well
Putting the added sugar point aside, feeding ourselves is one of the most important tasks we can do to show self-love, and this is a ritual that we can perform a number of times daily. Taking time to sit down and eat helps digestion and is as powerful as the balance you create on your plate.
How much protein we need can get a little complicated and there are many guidelines. I think just remembering to make sure you add protein to every meal - is already a great start. By adding protein, we give our body building blocks to repair and heal itself, and by adding fibre-rich foods, we improve our gut health and support natural detoxing.
By trying to increase protein and fibre with every meal, we end up staying full for longer, and don’t feel the need to snack so much. It is all very simple really, just try and bring awareness to your choices, reduce all white foods and go wild with colour!
Top Tips for 2025
Consider wearing a glucose monitor - best used with medical supervision when severe anxiety or eating disorders might be an issue
Focus on spending time alone or with your favourite energy boosting friends
Dust off that bedtime sleep routine - sleep really is your best friend
Love the water you drink - so make sure it is filtered at the very least
Enjoy feeding yourself and take time to eat at a table whenever possible
